


Green All Year Long

by phant0m



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, kaiba helps jounouchi move into his new apartment, kind of post-canon or whatever, that's the fic, they're boyfriends
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-01
Updated: 2021-02-01
Packaged: 2021-03-12 06:48:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29131332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phant0m/pseuds/phant0m
Summary: “Well, I already owe Honda dinner for helpin' me haul my furniture up the stairs and it’s kinda in your boyfriend job description to help me move, so looks like you’re stuck with me.” Jounouchi tugs at the end of his ponytail, that grin growing bolder, and Kaiba really must stop looking at his mouth so much. “Whether it’s convenient or not.”“You are nothing if not inconvenient.”“You looked at yourself in the mirror lately, Seto?”
Relationships: Jounouchi Katsuya/Kaiba Seto | Seto Kaiba/Joey Wheeler
Comments: 12
Kudos: 54





	Green All Year Long

**Author's Note:**

> Hello again! I'll spare everyone the usual lengthy note on where I've been and why. 2020 was hell. 2021 has, thus far, mostly continued to be hell. If I've had any spare brain space for writing, it's almost exclusively been used for novel or poetry work. However, my JouKai brain cell is always on, it's been far too long since I posted something, and my entire being desperately needed some soft boyfriend content. As such, I stayed up until 6AM on my birthday to give myself and all of you a little gift. I deliberately didn't want to get too heavy with this so I'm not sure my writing is up to par, but I needed it for my soul and figured posting it would bring a little joy into the world regardless, and that's really what this is all about. As always, enjoy!

Jounouchi packs for a move in a way that makes developing an eye twitch feel inevitable.

There’s seemingly no rhyme or reason to the way he’s shoved things into the bed of his worn out pickup truck. Smaller boxes sit beneath larger ones that teeter with the slightest breeze, all of them recycled from various retailers and questionably sealed with packing tape that seems to be losing its adhesive grip. Loosely knotted bags have been thrown in atop them, and a few stray items lay strewn about between with no protection at all, things Jounouchi appears to have only remembered as he was leaving. A few items, he suspects, are even piled in Jounouchi’s passenger seat. All in all, it’s a mess, and Jounouchi’s apartment is on the third floor.

Kaiba pinches the bridge of his nose, closes his eyes, and takes a deep breath.

When he opens them again, Jounouchi, a striking sight in the gold of late afternoon even in a faded graphic shirt from high school and acid washed jeans, is pulling his hair back into a ponytail with a hair tie around his wrist. Kaiba watches as he does it, memorizing for at least the thirty-second time the way he sticks the tip of his tongue out on habit, the scrunch in his nose and eyes that shouldn’t be so endearing, the practiced motions of his fingers almost delicate in their ministrations. Delicate in a way Jounouchi usually isn’t, except with…

Kaiba clears his throat. Jounouchi looks at him. He looks away.

“No one else was available to help you with this?”

“Nah, everyone’s busy.”

“Every single person you know is busy on the same day? How convenient.”

“I mean, it’s not that weird. We’re adults and shit. Honda’s got that job interview, Yuugi and Anzu are having a study bash kinda thing that I think Otogi’s goin’ to, it’s Ryou’s game night tonight, and…” Jounouchi pauses, shifts, voice filled with amusement. “Wait, are you accusin’ me of lyin’ just to spend time with you? C’mon, I don’t gotta lie for that. I could tell you I got the damn sniffles and you’d show up at my door even if I didn't ask you to.”

“I’m not accusing you of anything, though how swift you were to defend yourself would typically suggest a guilty conscience.” It’s not a particularly warm afternoon, but on the concrete and out of the shade, Kaiba can feel the sun bearing down on him anyway. He keeps his head down, meticulously unbuttoning the sleeves of his button-up to roll them up to his elbows and just as meticulously ignoring that Jounouchi is right. “I’m merely stating a fact. It’s convenient.”

The sun isn’t the only thing he can feel bearing down, though the second isn’t far from it: Jounouchi’s gaze. Kaiba looks up to catch him staring, unabashed as always, lingering on Kaiba’s hands and forearms too long to be considered decent before he snaps his eyes back up to Kaiba’s with a grin that doesn’t betray even a hint of shame.

It’s not a particularly warm afternoon, but it’s getting warmer by the second. He’s fundamentally opposed to the idea of kissing Jounouchi in an apartment complex parking lot in broad daylight. Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean the thought doesn’t cross his mind.

“Well, I already owe Honda dinner for helpin' me haul my furniture up the stairs and it’s kinda in your boyfriend job description to help me move, so looks like you’re stuck with me.” Jounouchi tugs at the end of his ponytail, that grin growing bolder, and Kaiba really must stop looking at his mouth so much. “Whether it’s convenient or not.”

“You are nothing if not inconvenient.”

“You looked at yourself in the mirror lately, Seto?”

That quick and concise of a comeback almost gets a laugh out of him. It’s a close call, caught by a smile that there’s no way he manages to hide in time. He gestures to the headache in the bed of the truck. “Do you at least have anything approaching a plan as to how we’re handling all of this?”

“Nope!”

“Of course not.”

The eye twitch, it turns out, was, indeed, inevitable, but it’s short-lived. Manual labor is far from Kaiba’s strong suit and further still from his preferred use of time, but Jounouchi’s presence does make it more bearable, turning it into a routine. They bicker all the way up and down floors, into the air of the fan whirring in Jounouchi’s small apartment and back out into the mild summer, trading nudges of a shoulder or elbow as they go and nearly dropping things more often than not. The boxes and bags, slowly forming pillars and piles in the living room, aren’t heavy. Kaiba wonders how much Jounouchi even had left to take with him, in the end.

Evening finds them nearly done, the sun beginning to dip behind the horizon faster than Jounouchi’s laughter, resounding off of the exterior walls, must alert his neighbors that spring itself is moving in nearby. How fortunate they’ll be to see green all year long. How worthy of envy.

“That was the last of it, correct?” Kaiba asks, touching his wrist to his forehead and trying to keep his breathing in check as he watches Jounouchi drop the suspected last box on top of one of the stacks.

“Maybe?” Jounouchi wipes the sweat off of his face with the sleeve of his shirt, which shouldn’t be attractive, but is just so purely _him_ that it is. His brow knits low for a moment, knuckle tapping against his chin, and then he brightens up all at once, blooming. “Wait, no. I gotta get one last thing. Be right back.”

Jounouchi is gone before Kaiba can even ask if he needs help, the sound of his sneakers striking the stairs echoing back through the doorway. Huffing, Kaiba runs a hand through his hair and turns to take in the apartment instead. With the lights on, he can appreciate it fully, already decorated with little touches Kaiba has never seen before. A sofa, plush and inviting if a bit worn around the edges, frames an old coffee table in the living room, and dishes sit on one of the kitchen counters. The dishes, a simplistic solid yellow, appear to be a set. He’s not sure he would have bet on Jounouchi Katsuya owning _a set_ of dishes in their lifetime, but things change.

He’s not sure he would have bet on taking a day off to help his partner move, for example. He’s not sure he would have bet on taking a day off or having a partner who helps him remember to do so.

" _Now_ we’re done,” Jounouchi announces, kicking the door closed behind him as he carries something into the kitchen to set it on a counter and plug it in. Kaiba follows him over to see what _one last thing_ could have possibly been, but when he does, he blinks twice, three times, as if convinced it’s a rogue hallucination that might disappear at any moment. 

“A coffee maker?” He asks, crossing his arms. “To my recollection, you’ve always made a point of telling me how much you loathe coffee.”

For some reason, it’s this perplexed observation of all things that seems to make Jounouchi shy. He averts his eyes, chewing on his lower lip and rubbing at the nape of his neck, no longer a bombastic presence but a gentled one. It’s as if he’s been caught doing something.

In the distance, the fan whirs. Kaiba, patient, lets the moment breathe.

“I hate it,” Jounouchi says at length, low and murmured, “but you don’t.”

Oh. Jounouchi bought it for _him_. The sentiment sits fond and strange in Kaiba’s chest, as if unsure which shape it should take. He’s not sure he’s ever had a piece of himself exist in someone else’s home. At least, not quite in this way. Not in a way that means he’s remembered, welcomed, thought of and prepared for. Kaiba isn’t keen on romance, but sometimes Jounouchi executes it in such a stumbling, beautiful, pitch perfect way it’s no wonder they’re here. The two of them damp and tired in Jounouchi’s still new apartment, sore from both faux begrudging cooperation and lively argument, neither of them giving an inch to yield the other any space. Perhaps things haven’t changed as much as he thought.

Jounouchi glances up at him, then away, starts to say, “Sorry if that’s weird, it’s just--”

“It’s not.” Kaiba drops his arms, pulls out his phone, the tips of his ears burning. “In fact, I appreciate it. I am also ravenous. Would you like to order takeout?”

“Yeah,” Jounouchi laughs, awkward and charming, thumbing at his nose. “Yeah. You read my fuckin’ mind.”

The fall of night is greeted by Jounouchi and Kaiba on the couch, empty containers scattered across Jounouchi’s coffee table, and an old photo album Jounouchi yanked from one of the boxes sprawled across their laps. They’re close, only barely not touching, and Jounouchi is telling him stories about youth and Shizuka and sandcastles on the beach and clandestine phone calls in the middle of the night. The hot tension of the day has melted into something cool and liquid and sleeping.

“How is she doing?” Kaiba asks when Jounouchi lapses into thought, pressing a finger over a childhood photo of the two of them beaming at the camera. He has that tender smile on his face that Kaiba knows he himself must wear when he looks at Mokuba sometimes, growing up far too fast and needing him less and less, but still there. A constant.

“She’s amazing, actually.” Jounouchi taps idly at the page, a wistful tinge to the words. “Woulda had her move in here with me, but she’s not too far out. Got a place near where Mai lives ‘cause it’s closer to her job, and ‘course I trust Mai to take care of her.” He sighs, leaning his head back against the sofa. “I just can’t believe she’s a nurse now. So damn proud of her.”

Kaiba watches him, wants to say something about how proud he should be of himself, but the words won’t come in an order that makes any sense. Instead, he finds himself reaching out, catching his nails against the skin of Jounouchi’s forearm in a silent gesture. Jounouchi’s eyes drift to him and he knows some fraction of it must be understood.

“Thank you.”

“For what, exactly?”

“Helpin' me today,” Jounouchi says, closing the album and sliding it off to the side. He shifts closer, just a bit, enough to knock their knees together. It’s a testament to how wrong most definitions of love are that they’ve been dating for months and such a simple movement can still make Kaiba feel like he’s sixteen again, burning alive with longing. “I’m sure you gotta know how complicated it is to leave…” He gestures. “Y’know.”

His father. That house. Kaiba does know. If only Jounouchi hadn’t been so insistent on doing, and buying, everything himself, they could’ve gotten him out sooner, but Kaiba would never begrudge a man his pride. His fingers curl where they rest, protective, digging into Jounouchi’s skin just slightly.

“It is my sworn duty to inform you of when you’re being a fool,” Kaiba says, and Jounouchi snorts, but he continues on anyway. “I did not do so earlier because you were right. I would have come regardless.”

“I know you woulda. I’m lucky like that.”

The sheer brazen nature of the compliment renders Kaiba speechless. Jounouchi regards him, in the silence, with such affection that it must make Kaiba’s heartbeat audible to the entire complex. Affection that, formerly, he would find himself undeserving of, or at the very least would find himself shrinking from. Affection that he allows himself to feel, now. It’s a victory that he only glances at Jounouchi’s lips once.

“Do you wanna stay the night?” The way Kaiba looks at him, caught off-guard by a sentence that has never once been said to him before, must be shocked sharp on instinct, because Jounouchi backtracks immediately. “I mean, you don’t gotta. I just thought you’re probably tired and it’s the least I can do, but like.” He’s rambling, looking up at the ceiling now and waving a hand. “My bed isn’t set up so it’s just my mattress on the floor and I know it’s nothin’ like your place so I get if you don’t--”

“Katsuya.” That one word is enough to silence him, but Kaiba leans in anyway, taking Jounouchi’s face in his hands and forcing eye contact. _I’ll stay anywhere so long as it’s with you._ “I’ll stay.”

Jounouchi searches his eyes for something, his own wide and brown and so warm warm warm, and he must find it for the way he presses their foreheads together. Kaiba stills for a moment, processing the proximity and weight of him, then relaxes into it with a quiet exhale.

“You sure about that?”

Something in the breathless way Jounouchi asks suggests he’s not talking about a single night’s sleep anymore, suggests he’s talking more broadly, about this, about them, but Kaiba thinks of the coffee maker and knows the shape feeling makes in his chest now. His heart. An answer.

“Even if you didn't ask me to.”

When Jounouchi finally presses forward to kiss him, it’s slow. There’s no need to rush anymore. Not here. His arms fall over Kaiba’s shoulders, clutching at his shirt, and Kaiba’s hands slide into his hair, pulling out his hair tie and running his fingers through windswept strands in a fluid and familiar movement. It’s tender, the breeze of the second and third kisses, flower petals and Jounouchi sighing against his mouth like he’s home in more ways than one. Kaiba has wanted this, so he takes his time, honey sweet on his lips of the fourth and fifth, combing the tangles out of Jounouchi’s hair and soothing him into the grass. Green all year long.

“I’ll make you coffee in the mornin’,” Jounouchi breathes, kisses him again, smoothing his palms across Kaiba’s shoulder blades. Kaiba makes a sound of assent and Jounouchi laughs a little, eyes sparking with mischief when he pulls back. “Then maybe you can help me unpack all that shit.”

Kaiba knows any bite in the comment is lost in his smile, but he has to stay it anyway.

“Don’t press your luck, Katsuya.”  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I mainly talk about Genshin Impact and Kpop these days, but you can always catch me on [Twitter](http://twitter.com/sageances) if you want to keep up with me. I hope everyone has a rad year to make up for. You know. Whatever the hell this has been. I'll see you when I see you and love you always. ♡
> 
> ETA: This fic now has a spiritual sequel in [The Weight of Water](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29286939)!


End file.
